


Coffee Witchery

by NightsMistress



Category: Hustle Cat (Visual Novel)
Genre: F/F, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-16
Updated: 2018-09-16
Packaged: 2019-07-10 07:48:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15944936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NightsMistress/pseuds/NightsMistress
Summary: With new covens come new responsibilities. Avery balances fending off a witch trying to claim their cafe with very important kissing time with her impossibly hot girlfriend.





	Coffee Witchery

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ember_Keelty](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ember_Keelty/gifts).



> Ember_keelty, I saw your prompt and immediately had to go off and play Hustle Cat. Several hours later, I too adored Mason.
> 
> My thanks to my beta, prosodiical.

As it turned out, with a new coven came new responsibility. More specifically, Avery was now trusted to look after the shop on her own when everyone else had to run errands. It was a responsibility that she was totally ready for, so long as no one attended all day and she was able to play with cats.

Unfortunately there was a customer, the first since everyone had left. He was dressed in tweed trousers and suspenders, with a bowler hat and horn-rimmed glasses completing the look. He looked like the kind of person who visited the expensive coffee shops that served them in glass tumblers and sourced its coffee from only the most exclusive places in the world. Or something; Avery didn't actually know that much about coffee despite having worked here for months now. 

He was clearly looking for something, blinking around him in a way that suggested that he was not looking at the delicious cakes in the display or the fluffy cats cavorting in the cat towers. Avery was not sure how he didn't notice the last one, as Ein was looking particularly cute today as he lounged on the window sill to get some sun.

"Can I help you?" Avery offered brightly when he continued to stand in the middle of the room and stare at everything.

"Yes," the guy said. "My name is Templeton. You can Give me this coffee shop."

Avery heard the capital G and knew that she was in for yet another magical battle. She missed the days where property ownership went through deeds or contracts or something. She was also pretty sure that the guy had given her a false name, because no one was called Templeton.

"Look, I'm going to call the cops if you don't get out," she said. "It's not even my coffee shop. I'm just the … floor manager? I guess?" It sounded better than she was minding the shop alone while everyone else was running errands. She could totally take care of this herself. Probably.

The witch shook his head. "You brought this on yourself," he said, and the coffee machine exploded. That answered what kind of witch he was at least.. Avery dubbed him Hipster Witch anyway, because it seemed unfair that Hayes didn't have coffee magic and this guy did.

It turned out that his powers weren't just limited to exploding coffee machines, as he fired jetstreams of coffee right where Avery was standing. It was like he was a coffeebender or something. The whole thing would have been pretty neat, it he hadn't been aiming his coffee right at her face.

"This is so not fair!" Avery yelped and she ducked under a table. A piping hot spray of espresso splattered on the recently cleaned surface, undoing all of her hard work. Reese was going to be insufferable about that later, assuming she survived this latest assault. She scrambled on hands and knees along the once-clean floor, scooping disposed napkins and creamer containers into her pockets as she went. 

She found a lucky break in a jam donut, its contents half-spilled onto the floor when a chair leg squashed it. That one, she prised off the ground and after imbuing it with magic threw at the hipster witch like a particularly sticky cannonball. It splattered against his horn-rimmed glasses with a satisfying squelch, covering his face with icing sugar, jam, and dirt. He spluttered and clawed at his face with a moist towelette, his splutters becoming more pronounced as it became increasingly obvious that it was stuck on with magic.

Avery used the opportunity to assess what she had in her stash. She had a small arsenal of creamer containers, two handfuls of plastic stirrers, and a number of damp, discarded napkins. Quite impressive, considering that Landry had left the place spotless a couple of hours earlier. She used the creamer containers as projectiles, shooting them from her hastily constructed napkin cannon. He waved his hands blindly, glasses still smeared with jam, as he tried to ward off the creamers. Avery dashed out towards the coffee preparation area, skidding to a halt before the rubbish.

For some reason, Avery had been assigned rubbish duty today. She hadn't done it. Empty syrup containers, packets of ingredients, and other mysterious items that she supposed related to the brewing of coffee spilled out of the several bins that they kept in the kitchen. Clearly past her had been looking out for her at this moment, and it was totally not because she was lazy or forgot.

She bit her lip and started conjuring a familiar with the rubbish she had available. She used the syrup containers as stumpy little legs and a gaping maw, flour packets as filmy wings, and fruit scraps as scales. She didn't have anything to use for eyes, but supposed she didn't need it. Not for a dragon, anyway.

She had expected it to be bigger. The trash in the bin had looked like a lot, but once she had assembled it into a dragon, it only stood as high as her knee. She patted its head anyway, between the ears made of discarded sugar packets, and it silently purred.

"My familiar!" she announced. "Fear its wrath!"

Hipster Witch did not fear her trash dragon's wrath. He just raised his eyebrows and folded his arms.

"What are you going to do, make it lick me to death?" he sneered.

It was a fair question. Avery hadn't thought this far ahead. She stood up behind her trash dragon and made it roar at Hipster Witch anyway. It then rubbed against the leg of her jeans, smearing them with caramel syrup and chocolate dusting. It was _adorable_. Mochi had better watch out, because Avery's trash dragon had existed for all of a minute and was already worming its way into her heart.

She could hear the coffee machine fire up again. Right. Fight Hipster Witch first, debate merits of adorably sticky trash dragon over fat and fluffy cat later.

"It eats souls!" she announced, and was proud at how intimidating the threat sounded. "Every garbage collection day it hungers for human flesh and blood!"

"Garbage collection day was yesterday," Hipster Witch pointed out. He heaved a martyred sigh and screwed up his face in a way that Avery supposed he thought looked benevolent. Mostly he just looked pissed and covered in jam filling. "Just Give me the coffee shop already. You're embarrassing both of us."

"Just you!" Avery retorted, not bothering to correct his misapprehension about who owned the coffee shop. "I have no shame at all!"

She was totally nailing being a badass witch. Pity Hipster Witch didn't appreciate her witty repartee.

"I noticed." He sighed, insufferably, turning towards the coffee machine to prepare another scalding spray. Avery looked around her for something to use as a shield. Other than repurposing her dragon -- which _absolutely not_ \-- she had nothing. If only Mason was here, rather than visiting her grandfather. She was really good at dealing with witches with a fiery right cross. 

Then, as if she managed to summon her ridiculously hot girlfriend through wishful thinking, Mason exploded from the kitchen. Hipster Witch turned around to face her, eyes wide and startled behind his glasses, before directing his stream of coffee straight at Mason's face. She put her hands up, her forearms crossing, and blue flame wreathed her arms. It vaporised the coffee before it could even come close to splashing her.

It was the coolest thing that Avery had ever seen.

Then Mason followed it up with two punches, one to the guy's solar plexus and one to his jaw. Avery winced at the sickening impact. He hit the floor, curled up around his stomach, and made no attempt to get up. Mason cracked her knuckles and curled her lip in anticipation of a throwdown, somehow radiating sheer fury and contempt at the same time. Also radiating literal fire, though that was dying down now that Hipster Witch was making no effort to get up.

"Ohthankgodyou'rehere," Avery said and wobbled on her feet. Mason steadied her, and Avery took comfort in how rock-steady Mason was. She was a literal amazon, but with fire. Or something. Avery thought she could be excused her poor analogies after fighting a coffee witch in a coffeeshop.

"You alright?" The quiet question, accompanied by the smouldering look she aimed at Hipster Witch, suggested that there would be a world of pain if Avery wasn't. 

"I'm good! Also we have a new pet." She nodded at her trash dragon, who was rubbing up against Mason's leg now in a way far more affectionate than it had with Avery. Normally Avery would have been insulted at the foul betrayal by her familiar, but she could understand why it was so enamoured with Mason after that display. Who wouldn't be?

"Can see that." Avery looked up and saw the small smile at the corner of Mason's mouth. She got up on her toes and kissed it. 

"Should we call the police?" she murmured as she broke away for air, lips ghosting against Mason's cheek. It was nice being this close to her.

"Already did." Mason shrugged.

"I knew there was a reason I loved you."

Avery thought that she'd like to kiss Mason again, as watching her do that arm block was amazingly cool. Unfortunately, Hipster Witch ruined the moment by trying to get up. He managed to climb to his hands and knees before falling down once more with a shuddering cry. Avery winced. Mason had not held back at all.

"You should probably stay down," Avery offered. Mason simply rested her foot between his shoulder blades, pushing him down to the ground. "The police will be here soon."

Gina did arrive soon, and helped Templeton to his feet to take him away. Avery was surprised to learn that Templeton was his actual name, because she hadn't met anyone called Templeton before. He sneered at the two of them as he was helped out, and Avery waved awkwardly. Mason just loomed. She was very good at looming.

"That was so cool," Avery said, once she was sure that Gina was out of earshot. "With the arm cross and everything!"

"Eh," Mason said, shrugging. "'Sokay, I guess."

"Shh, let me tell you how awesome that was," Avery replied. She was about to continue when Mason took matters into her own hands and pinned Avery to the wall. Avery's brain short-circuited, allowing her to think only that this was cool too before she was otherwise occupied with Mason kissing her. It was a very good kiss by Avery's experience, though she thought that she should get more of them. For science.

Then there was the flash of a camera and Finley cooing, "Oh my god, you two are so cute!! That's definitely going on the blog."

"Finley no," Avery sighed.

"Finley _yes_ ," Finley retorted.

And that was the end of that. Avery made a note to kiss her girlfriend in the kitchen next time, safe from cameras and prying eyes. Maybe her trash dragon could be a sentry. It would be fun to find out.


End file.
